Typical instrument clusters may have one or more illumination devices that light the front and/or back of the instrument cluster. Typically, the illumination device may be dimmed causing the entire instrument cluster to change lighting intensity. Moreover, other instrument clusters may change, flash or coordinate lights when the vehicle is turned on which may be referred to as a wowing affect. In other instances, individual segments on the instrument cluster may be lit or extinguished as increments in vehicle speed change. For example, when one vehicle speed is reached one segment is lit; as an additional increment in vehicle speed is reached, an additional segment is lit.
With reference to FIG. 1, a typical speedometer 10 is shown. The speedometer 10 may include a plurality of indicia 12, which may include tick marks 14, characters 16 and/or a border 18. Each of the indicia 12 may be lit by an illumination device behind said indicia 12. A rotatable pointer 20 may rotate about the speedometer 10 and point selectively to the indicia 12 to indicate a current vehicle speed. As the pointer 20 rotates beyond a certain value (e.g., about 35 miles an hour), the indicia 12, which are associated with a speed fewer than 35 miles an hour, remain lit. The indicia 12, which are associated with a speed greater than 35 miles an hour, remain dark. As the pointer 20 travels over each indicia 12, the indicia 12 change from being dark to being lit. In this arrangement, the illumination of the indicia 12 appears choppy relative to the smooth travel of the pointer 20.